Ben Fountain Quotes

Somewhere along the way America became a giant mall with a country attached.

It took me 10 years to write a story that pleased me - that I could look at after it was published and not cringe.

It is sort of weird being honored for the worst day of your life.

Late bloomer' is another way of saying 'slow learner.

By the end of the first decade of writing, I considered myself a confirmed failure in the eyes of the world.

I never listen to music when I'm writing.

Americans are incredibly polite as long as they get what they want.

There was no such thing as perfection in this world, only moments of such extreme transparency that you forgot yourself, a holy mercy if there ever was one.

If you could figure out how to live with family then you'd gone a long way toward finding your peace.

I realized I was never going to have any peace with myself unless I made an honest stab at trying to write.

I quit law in 1988 to start writing, and it took me 17 years from that point to get a book contract. I guess you can say I was on the slow train.

I thought when I started writing that I'd have a book out in four or five years, and as it became apparent that that wasn't going to happen, I became increasingly frustrated and unsure of myself.

I started publishing stories in small magazines early on, but after seven or eight or nine years you feel like you need a little more than that to show for your efforts.

Maybe the light's at the other end of the tunnel.

The Kessler Theater is one such gem, an Art Deco beauty … for a slice of real life, there’s always the Kessler.

It's amazing what happens when you stick yourself in a place and let things take their more or less natural course.

I think if you spend much time dwelling on influence you can get self-conscious about every line you write. That's a great way to freeze up.

I'm ashamed and embarrassed to say that I've read very little of David Foster Wallace's work. It's a huge gap in my education, one of many.

Eruptions of talent continue to happen in Haiti, in spite of everything.

I kept going back while I was writing the novel - which never sold, may it rest in peace - and by the time it was finished I had too many connections to Haiti to walk away.

The funny thing is, about the time I let go of any aspiration toward worldly success, that's about the time I started writing decent work.

I like to kill my enemies and listen to the lamentations of their women

Americans are children who must go somewhere else to grow up, and sometimes die.

America loves to pray, God knows. America prays and prays and prays, it is the land of unchained prayer, and all this ceremonial praying is hard on Billy.

As if sorrow is the true reality? Without ever putting his mind to it, he's come to believe that loss is the standard trajectory.